On Friday night in Nashville, from the start to the end, it was the Ole Miss Rebels' game to win or lose. For almost seven minutes of the first half, Alabama trailed Ole Miss by double digits. From the 2:44 mark, Alabama clawed back to trail by six at the half.
Ole Miss scored first in the second half to push the lead to nine. The Rebels' second-half lead grew to 12 points twice, at 12:43 and 10:35. Alabama did not quit. The Crimson Tide even had a chance to win at the end, but didn't.
After the game, Nate Oats said he should have called a timeout on the Tide's next to last possession, the one in which Labaron Philon drove and passed off to Aiden Sherrell, only for Ole Miss to deny Sherrell a shot. Directly under the basket, if Sherrell had gone up and scored, Alabama would have led by, and probably won by a point.
The Crimson Tide did not lose on that failure to produce a basket. Alabama lost for two reasons. One reason was that Ole Miss had an excellent defensive game plan, and the Rebels executed it. The other reason was Alabama's repeated defensive failures.
Alabama having to play catchup to an SEC Tourney 15-seed
After the game, Nate Oats talked about the Tide's defensive performance. "If we give the same effort in the NCAA Tournament that we gave in the first 30 minutes tonight, we’ll be home quickly." Oats added, "It wasn't just the younger guys. Some of our older guys didn't give us the effort we needed in the first half either."
It is true that if Alabama had shot better than its 30% accuracy on three, the Crimson Tide could have won the game. Latrell Wrightsell was an uncharacteristic 0-4 outside the arc, as was Amari Allen. Aiden Sherrell was 0-2, and Houston Mallette was 1-4.
The shooting woes should not cloud the main Crimson Tide weakness. As Nate Oats said, for most of the game, the defensive performance and, too often, the defensive effort was unacceptable.
Oats made another telling comment, saying some of his players "need to do some soul searching before the NCAA Tournament." That might be true of the coaching staff as well.
Note: Stats provided by Stat Broadcast